Roku is one of the biggest names in the set-top box market, and today the company took the wraps off of a few new additions to its lineup.
Roku today announced the Roku Express, Roku Premiere, Roku Premiere+, and Roku Ultra. All models are available for pre-order starting today, September 26, at Roku.com, Walmart, Best Buy, Amazon, and other retailers. Devices are expected to be in stores starting October 9.
The Roku Express is the cheapest of the bunch with a price of $29.99. The tiny stick offers 1080p HD streaming, 802.11b/g/n wireless, and a simple IR remote for controlling the device. Roku is also including an adhesive strip so that you can stick the Express to your TV if you’d like.
There will also be a Roku Express+ model that’ll cost $39.99 and will be exclusive to Walmart. This model comes with a composite jack and composite A/V cable (red/white/yellow) for use with older TVs.
The next step up is the Roku Premiere for $79.99. The Premiere offers features like 4K Ultra HD video playback, support for upscaling 720p to 1080p or up to 4K on TVs that support it, 802.11ac MIMO dual-band wireless, a quad-core processor, and a listening mode that’ll adjust audio to maintain volume consistency. The Premiere is $79.99.
Stepping up to the $99.99 Roku Premiere+ will get you HDR support, a better “point anywhere remote” with a headphone jack so that you can listen to your audio without disturbing others, a microSD card slot, and an ethernet port for a wired internet connection.
The Roku Ultra is the most premium of this bunch. It includes all the features of the Premiere+ as well as Dolby Digital/Dolby Digital Plus decoding; optical digital audio out for hooking up to a receiver or sound bar, a USB port for local media playback; a “point anywhere remote” with voice search, gaming buttons, and a headphone jack; and a lost remote finder feature.
As you might expect, the Roku Ultra is also the priciest of the bunch, carrying a price tag of $129.99.
